Coffee Break

It’s Earth Day - and time for a little bit of inconvenient truth. Coffee - my liquid love, the elixir of mental alacrity, the delicious duenna of my daily delight - is a serious natural resources hog. Its production and delivery puts a major strain on the Earth’s resources, especially when you count in the damage done to the environment by huge coffee conglomerate farms that strip the rain forests to plant coffee bushes.

On the other hand, coffee bushes (or trees, if you prefer) are a precious natural resource. They’re part of the rain forest canopy and provide food and shelter for birds, insects and other animal life that are vital to the health of the rain forests. Coffee also provides a living for millions of people in coffee growing countries, and is the main export product of dozens of countries. It is the most popular beverage in the world - at least, if you don’t count WATER. It has also been the vehicle and the impetus for some pretty serious social change over the past thirty or so years.

So how do you reconcile coffee and environmentalist concerns? How do you drink coffee in a greener way? Here are a few suggestions for ways to enjoy your coffee without adding to the Earth’s burden.

• Drink coffee from Fair Trade and direct trade sources. Yeah, I know. I sound like a broken record, but it is the single biggest change you can make in your life to reduce the impact of coffee drinking on the world.
• Use a reusable mug when you buy your coffee out. Styrofoam cups don’t break down. Cardboard cups take their toll on the trees, even the post-consumer recycled ones.  Buy yourself a good travel coffee mug, and use it whenever you buy coffee on the run.

Choose a method of brewing coffee that doesn’t use electricity. There are lots and lots of choices. Here are a few:

Moka Pot	French Press	Stovetop Percolator
Cooking.com $12.95	Bozcov.com $19.95	Bozcov.com $14.95

More Earth Friendly Coffee Ideas

Looking for something to do with your kids for Earth Day? Check out this clever Earth Day coffee craft idea from Kaboose.com.

Check out this video about making coffee with an Aeropress at CoffeeNate.com - why Aeropress on Earth Day? It’s a no-electricity coffee maker, so it doesn’t increase your carbon footprint.  And the paper coffee filters are reusable - within reason, of course.

Don’t forget about our Great Virtual Fair Trade Coffee Break taking place the first two weeks in May. Just enjoy a cup of Fair Trade coffee or tea (or play soccerwith a Fair Trade soccer ball, eat a Fair Trade chocolate bar or banana - there are LOTS of choices) and blog about it at your blog, then add your URL to the Mr. Linky widget to get counted as part of the U.S. Fair Trade Coffee Break - and take the title of Largest Fair Trade Event in History back from Finland.

Update: Check out more Earth-friendly coffee ideas at Daily Shot of Coffee, where my new blogging buddy, Mike, has a few ideas I didn’t touch on.

And be sure to drop by my new gig at Blog on Smog - Wet Wednesday to find out how climage change is affecting what you love to drink.

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